


this dark world aches for a splash of the sun

by linil



Series: take heart with the day, and begin again [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Found Family, Gen, Podfic Available, The Golden Trio, isnt that wild damn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-18
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:15:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23718055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/linil/pseuds/linil
Summary: The point is, Harry is having a right old time and he is suddenly, very muchnotpale. He’s outside as much as is physically possible, which means he soaks up gallons of sunlight a day. It seeps into his skin, into the muscles and bones beneath, probably, staining him a warm mahogany, barely paler than Hermione.
Relationships: Hermione Granger & Harry Potter & Ron Weasley
Series: take heart with the day, and begin again [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1762309
Comments: 65
Kudos: 824
Collections: Anodyne fics





	this dark world aches for a splash of the sun

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [there will come a time, you'll see](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15275916) by [aloneintherain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aloneintherain/pseuds/aloneintherain). 



> **CW: issues with food**  
>  harry eats too much, some mentions of vomiting as a result (skip from ‘When Ron thinks about it again barely an hour later’ to ‘Really, Ron doesn’t properly notice’ and then skip from ‘Hermione imagines she looks the same’ to ‘“The muggles”’)
> 
> thinking about Indian harry, who has spent years locked in a cupboard and at least half his summers at hogwarts not allowed to be seen by anyone and therefore probably not allowed to leave the house much. how much sun do you think that boy gets?
> 
> title from Cough Syrup by Young the Giant
> 
> edit: please go listen to the podfic by sunflowerstorm!!! it was absolutely stunning!!!!

The first time Ron meets Harry Potter, his skin is barely darker than Ron’s. 

It’s not something Ron thinks about at the time: this is Harry Potter, Saviour of the Wizarding World, Defeater of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, the Answer to Every Problem There Has Ever Been, or whatever. He’s, you know, _famous_. 

And he wants to be friends with _Ron_.

So forgive Ron for not noticing, in his moment of sheer disbelief, that Harry Potter looks almost pale enough to be his cousin. He’s got bigger things to worry about right now.

(Like _Harry Potter_ wanting to sit with _him_ ; like Harry Potter buying the entire bloody trolley of sweets; like Harry’s broken glasses; like Harry’s soft, shaking voice.)

Lots of things to worry about.

When they’re sat in the Great Hall for the first time, Ron babbles on animatedly about the dormitories and the castle and the food and quidditch, and Harry nods and nods and nods. His shaggy hair flops around his eyes when he does — the cut is choppy at best — and it looks almost blacker than the night sky above them. 

(When Ron thinks about it again, months, years later when he somehow has _even more_ things to worry about, he thinks to himself that Harry’s hair had made him seem even paler. The sharp contrast had stuck out, dulled slightly by the warm glow of the Great Hall.)

Harry looks giddy. Ron chatters on, striking up a conversation with anyone close enough to hear him, and Harry piles his plate high with whatever he can reach. He smiles and laughs as they speak with the people around them, his voice still soft but without the shake this time. As he eats, he keeps looking around at everyone, everything, like he thinks it might all disappear at any moment.

When Ron looks back after a few minutes, he finds Harry’s plate empty.

(When Ron thinks about it again barely an hour later, as he panics quietly in the bathroom and Seamus, Dean and Neville panic not-so-quietly in their bedroom, as Harry empties the contents of his dinner into the toilet and tries valiantly to choke out apologies and explanations, Ron thinks about it and wonders if Harry had thought the food might disappear at any moment, too.)

Really, Ron doesn’t properly notice until after Christmas. The sun floods the castle grounds and takes longer and longer to sink below the horizon each day. This translates into longer afternoons spent idling in the courtyard, weather warm enough to wander without their robes, and perfect conditions for flying.

Harry is _glowing_. From the first moment he kicks off the ground and shoots into the sky, something inside him catches fire, spreads its wings, soars. He spends as many evenings as he can in the air, and spends the rest of his time vibrating out of his seat with the need to be on a broom again. Ron joins him when he feels like it, sometimes Seamus and Dean, too. Neville looks faintly like he might pass out when they ask if he wants to come. 

And see, okay, Ron knows that Harry is _good_. You don’t just get drafted into the quidditch team as a first year. He’s a tiny thing, really, but that only seems to make him faster if anything.

(Hermione started spouting _science_ nonsense when he mentioned this to her once, something about area and speed and _terminal velocity, Ron, this is fundamental physics_ — Ron stopped listening around that point.)

The point is, Harry is having a right old time and he is suddenly, very much _not_ pale. He’s outside as much as is physically possible, which means he soaks up gallons of sunlight a day. It seeps into his skin, into the muscles and bones beneath, probably, staining him a warm mahogany, barely paler than Hermione.

On a nondescript Saturday afternoon, the three of them are down on the pitch again. Ron is sprawled on the grass, watching Harry drift in and out of view above him. Hermione is sat up, mumbling something about charms that Ron is, like, eighty five percent sure she shouldn’t even be _thinking_ about until third year. She makes a vaguely worrying sound that could probably be a growl, slams her book down onto the ground and throws herself backwards so she’s frowning up at the sky, arms tossed out to her sides. Her theatrics have the unfortunate result of her hand slapping Ron in the chin. Ron reaches somewhere to his left and pats what is probably her face. 

Harry’s meandering loop around the pitch tightens into a downward spiral, bringing him to a rest hovering a few metres above them. Ron’s got to admit, this isn’t his best angle, but the dying spring sun sets his hair ablaze and his smile is incandescent. 

It is at this moment that Ron realises with an idle sort of wonder that Harry’s eyes are a startling green. He feels Hermione’s hand curl into a fist just below his chin and when he turns to look at her she is looking at Harry with a truly disgusting amount of fondness. Ron would call her a sap if he knew his face didn’t look just the same.

* * *

Hermione doesn’t notice straight away, because she is _furious_. They are barely hours into their second year and already those two idiots are verging on expulsion.

Ron and Harry burst into Hogwarts in what can only be described as a complete and utter disaster and somehow escape with their lives and their educations bruised, but intact. 

Hermione is going to _scream_. What kind of _moron_ risks their enrolment at _Hogwarts_ on such a _stupid stunt_?

And she does scream at them; for about five minutes while any Gryffindor unlucky enough to be in the common room does their best to melt into the floor or slip up to their rooms. She is _fuming_ and it is essential that these two fools know it.

Then after five minutes she finally runs out of steam and drags them both into a bone crushing hug.

“We missed you too, ‘Mione,” Ron mumbles against her hair, and she can feel Harry’s smile pressed into her shoulder. 

No, Hermione notices the next day. Now, see, Hermione is a very smart person. This is an indisputable fact and in no way hyperbolic. So Hermione, being so immensely knowledgeable, can say with a fair measure of certainty that people tend to get more tanned over the summer, not _significantly_ paler. 

Then again, when has Harry Potter ever fit into expectations.

The next morning at breakfast she sees Harry and Ron in the light for the first time in almost two months, and freezes half way through reaching for a slice of toast: she doesn’t think she’s ever seen Harry look this pale in her life. Even Ron managed to catch the sun over the holidays, his cheeks looking rosier than ever, and she can see to her left that Seamus’ freckles have increased exponentially.

Harry looks almost sick with how pasty his face is. She knows he isn’t, which just makes her worry even more.

Ron notices her moment of confusion and sets his knife down on his plate, frowning at her. He follows her gaze to Harry, and doesn’t quite succeed in concealing his wince. He looks back at Hermione and mouths _later_. Hermione isn’t sure if she should be more or less concerned. 

Harry, of course, does not notice, and instead drops a piece of toast in her outstretched hand.

‘Later’ comes at ten thirty in the common room. Harry and Ron bid her goodnight and Ron drops a scrap of parchment on Hermione’s book, then dashes after Harry before he could notice. In Ron’s chicken scratch scrawl on the parchment is written _be back here in one hour_. 

Hermione’s worry is only mounting.

She goes to her room, dumps her books on her dresser, puts on her pyjamas, brushes her teeth and braids her hair back into something manageable. Which all takes her about ten minutes, leaving her another fifty to stew in her unease. Every second that passes only brings her closer to full on panic.

In the end she decides to wait in the common room, staring at the same page in her book for what seems like hours before she hears footsteps coming down the stairs from the boys’ rooms. When she looks up, it’s Ron.

She snaps her book shut as Ron comes over to sit on the sofa beside her, back against the arm rest so he’s facing her and his knees drawn up to his chest. He frowns at a spot on the cushion and chews absently on his lip. He looks worried. Hermione imagines she looks the same.

He smells vaguely of vomit, and Hermione is saddened to think she knows why. 

“The muggles,” Ron’s voice comes out rough and he coughs to clear it, “The muggles had bars on his window. Like, proper prison bars, Hermione, we had to pull them off with the car.” His hands are white-knuckled on the fabric of his trousers.

“And his door was locked. From the outside. You’d think it was Gringotts, or something — it sounded like a dozen locks just to get in his door.” Hermione sets her hand on his shin and he lets his legs slip down the cushions until his feet bump Hermione’s thigh.

Hermione’s a smart person. 

“I assume he didn’t have the keys.”

Ron huffs a weak laugh. 

“No, I’m guessing he didn’t.”

They try to talk to Harry about it. They really do, but then suddenly Mrs. Norris turns up dead and there’s blood on the wall and everyone thinks Harry is going to kill them; his hissing doesn’t help him any in that department. 

They’ve all got bigger things to worry about right now. And that’s even before Hermione is petrified. 

By the time she’s free again, the basilisk dead and Lockhart indisposed, she has mostly forgotten about the conversation they had. Harry’s skin almost looks like the same golden brown it had been by the end of first year, if a little scratched and bloodied. 

It’s not until they’re already on the train back to London that she remembers. She takes one look at Harry’s face, staring longingly out the window like he can still see Hogwarts if he just looks hard enough, and that night comes flooding back to her. But by then it’s too late to say anything, and she watches Harry disappear into the crowd once they reach King’s Cross. 

* * *

Hermione and Ron see Harry again at the Leaky Cauldron just before they begin third year. He looks just as pale as he always does after summer, this time with the added bonus of a bone-deep sadness. He tells them in fits and starts about his aunt and uncle, about Marge, about what she said and what he did. His hands are clenched so tight that Hermione has to pry them open to stop him from cutting his palms. Ron’s arm stays firm across Harry’s shoulders.

Hermione tends to cherish every moment she gets to see Harry in the sky, these days. Sirius Black is on the loose and there are dementors in Hogwarts. It seems like no where is safe. But when Harry is up there, he looks unstoppable, he looks all at once like Harry Potter, the indestructible Boy Who Continues to Live and Just Harry, ruffled and windswept and smiling so, so brightly. His eyes are so green against the copper slowly returning to his cheeks.

And then, of course, the dementor attacks him. Hermione can’t do anything. She’s frozen in the stands just the same as everyone else and she has to stand there and watch as Harry Potter, indestructible, Just Harry, smile fading, Harry, her _best friend_ , plummets towards the ground.

She hears an ear splitting shriek. She doesn’t know if it’s her or Ron.

Harry looks unbearably fragile in the infirmary. Ron would be happy if he never had to see Harry in here again; he’s sure if he looked hard enough he could find Harry’s name engraved somewhere on this bed. He’s not going to, but he _could_.

Hermione’s sat on the other side of Harry’s bed, clutching the chocolate bar Professor Lupin had left with them like it’s the only thing tethering her to this moment. He wonders if she’s looking at the way Harry’s skin sharply contrasts the all encompassing white of the bed sheets; wonders if she’s thinking about how he almost could have blended right in with it only a few months ago. 

When she looks up from Harry’s face and stares straight back at Ron, he knows that she is.

“We have to talk to him about this.” She sets the chocolate bar down on the bedside table. He can see the wrapper folding where she’s managed to crack it in two. He desperately hopes she doesn’t see his grimace. “You know we do, Ron.” Ah, caught.

Ron sighs heavily, leaning over to pluck the chocolate off the table, unwrap it and snap a row off. Hermione glowers but doesn’t reject it when he offers her half the row. 

“I know, ‘Mione,” he drags a hand through his hair, “I just don’t want to upset him.” He thinks she might see through him when he says it. Because the truth is, he’s scared to hear the answer. He thinks he might already know what it will be, but coming up with an idea in his head and hearing the horrible reality of it spoken aloud are two entirely different things. 

If she does, she doesn’t call him out on it. She scrutinises him for another second, two, then stands up. Ron watches as she drags her chair around the bed and sets it back down right beside him. She sits and immediately leans her full weight into his side. 

Ron yelps and almost topples right off the chair, desperately clinging to the bed frame to make sure they don’t both go crashing to the ground. Hermione seems entirely unbothered by this. Unbelievable. Ron gripes and grumbles but resigns himself to his fate. In the corner of his eye he sees Hermione latch onto Harry’s hand and he turns and hides a smile in his shoulder. 

* * *

They’re in fifth year when Harry finally tells them. 

It’s just the three of them in the Room of Requirement, the rest of the DA long gone for the day. They’re all loosely arranged in front of the fireplace: Ron cross-legged and slouched back, palms on the floor behind him; Harry lying face up on the ground, his legs thrown into Ron’s lap; Hermione laying on her stomach, propped up by her elbows and leaning into Ron’s knee. Sometimes Ron resents being the tallest, if this is what he gets in return. 

Harry’s stag is curled gracefully around him, its head arched over Harry’s like a sentinel. Hermione and Ron’s patronuses are too busy skipping around just above Ron’s head. 

The spectral glow that emanates off the patronuses washes over the three of them. Harry looks far too pale.

This may not be the best time. Hermione knows that, objectively. There is turmoil in Hogwarts and Harry’s dreams are worse than ever. Umbridge could come charging into the Room of Requirement any day now. The scars on Harry’s hand are still pink and tender. 

However, there’s a fair chance they might not get a better time. 

“Harry,” she starts, and even she can hear the trepidation in her voice. Harry and Ron both look sharply towards her; and something in her face must betray her, because Ron looks terrified for just a second. But he doesn’t try to stop her.

Well, she may as well go straight for it, now. Gryffindor courage and all that.

“Harry,” she tries again, “why do you always come back so pale after summer?” 

She swallows her immediate regret when Harry’s face shutters and Ron blanches slightly. She can feel apologies swelling behind her teeth, but she’s going to see this through. 

Harry looks. Well. He looks straight up at the ceiling and says nothing for a few, agonisingly long moments. The muscles in his jaw are working, his mouth opening and closing but no sound coming out. Until —

“I’m not really allowed outside.” 

And Hermione feels her heart fall through her stomach, sees Ron bite his lip so hard he draws blood, because she’d _known_ what the answer was going to be even before she asked. He’s barely said anything yet and she feels already like she might strain something in her effort to remain completely calm.

“Why?”

They’re staring straight at him, but Harry keeps his eyes trained up, away from both of them. There’s another pause that drifts slowly by, and then Harry speaks like it’s being punched out of him.

“‘Cause they hate me. Because I’m a freak,” his stag is starting to waver behind him, blurring around the edges. “So I cant go outside, because then people could see me, and they don’t want that.” He’s carefully neutral, in a way that comes with years of practice. “Can’t ruin their reputation if no one ever even knows who I am, now can I?” His stag flickers out of view.

Hermione can hear her teeth groaning with how hard she’s clenched her jaw. She wants to _strangle_ something.

Ron sets one hand on her head and she whips around to look at him, but he’s already yanking Harry’s legs towards him. 

Harry screeches and his arms go flailing out around him. Hermione thinks a tad hysterically that he looks like a startled bird, arms flapping and hair haloed around his head. However, Ron’s manhandling seems to have the desired effect of bringing the rest of Harry within grabbing distance, and it is moments like these where he absolutely does _not_ resent being the tallest, because it means he can haul Harry up against his chest and wrap his arms right the way around him. 

Harry’s sprawled half way across Ron’s legs and half way across the floor, his head tucked under Ron’s chin and trapped in the inescapable cage of Ron’s lanky arms. Hermione starts giggling slightly manically, on the floor beside him, and pushes herself into what could loosely be classified as a sitting position so she can latch herself onto the two of them. Her arms go around Harry’s shoulders and Ron’s back, and her giggles have turned into tiny hiccups that she doesn’t want to think too hard about. Ron can feel Harry’s erratic breathing against his collar. 

“You twat,” Harry chokes out into Ron’s shirt, half laugh, half sob. Ron just tightens his arms. Hermione’s strange hiccups morph into tiny hitches in her breath. 

“Yeah,” Ron mumbles against Harry’s hair, finding Hermione’s hand on Harry’s back, squeezing it and holding it there, “yeah, maybe.” 

“I’m sorry, Harry.” Hermione whispers into the space between Harry and Ron’s shoulders. “I’m so sorry.” 

Harry doesn’t reply, but he reaches one trembling hand up to grip at Hermione’s arm, and that’ll just have to be enough.

* * *

The sun is just peaking in through the windows of the Burrow. Ron’s not sure why he’s awake so early, but he knows there’s no chance he’ll get back to sleep now. 

( _Never used to be a problem_ he thinks idly. _Used to be able to sleep in for hours and hours_. He supposes war does that to a person.)

It’s been two days since the Battle of Hogwarts. Ron can still feel the ache in his bones (his heart is another matter altogether).

He pads lightly down the stairs and putters about in the kitchen making hot chocolate. He’s surprised he can still do this off muscle memory: it’s been months since he was back home. He’s already got three cups of hot chocolate steaming on the table by the time he realises the other two probably aren’t awake. 

Well, they can reheat them. 

He pads into the living room with one of the cups, which of course means that both of them are already in there. Ron sighs, sets his own cup down, and goes back to get the other two. 

He realises, when he comes back in, that Harry is still asleep. He’s slumped across the sofa, head in Hermione’s lap. The sunlight sets his skin on fire, glowing a golden umber. 

Ron moves over to Hermione and waits for her to look up from her book so he can hand the cup to her, his eyes trained on Harry’s face. It is at that precise moment that it occurs to him, for the first time, that Harry never has to go back to the Dursley’s ever again. 

The thought makes something spark and explode in his chest.

Hermione taps his hand where his fingers are still curled around the cup, and when he turns to look at her she takes it and replaces it with her hand, their fingers laced together. She sets it down beside her and then brings her other hand to card absentmindedly through Harry’s untamed hair. 

His eyes shine dazzling green when he opens them, and his smile is incandescent.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[PODFIC] this dark world aches for a splash of the sun](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28932285) by [sunflowerstorm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflowerstorm/pseuds/sunflowerstorm)




End file.
